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Viacom Says "YouTube Depends On Us"
Anonycat writes "Michael Fricklas, a lawyer for Viacom, has an opinion piece in the Washington Post laying out Viacom's side in their $1 billion lawsuit against YouTube. Fricklas asserts that the DMCA's 'safe harbor' provisions don't apply because YouTube is knowledgeable to infringement and furthermore derives financial benefit from it. He also argues that putting the onus of spotting infringement onto the content providers represents an undue burden on them. Fricklas caps the argument by stating, 'Google and YouTube wouldn't be here if not for investment in software and technologies spurred by patent and copyright laws.'"
It's going to suck for viacom when youTube calls Stephen Colbert to the stand. He's highlighted original content from youTube, He had representatives of a small comnercial venture (the band OK go) on to talk about how they used youTube to publish an Ad (their music videos), and he has multiple times asked people to make fair use parody content going so far as to make green screen segments to make it easier.
IANAL, yada, yada...
"Grokster, if you recall, was explicit about saying that the company was guilty of contributory infringement only because they *encouraged unauthorized copying. The argument that "they benefited" from this copying was insufficient to that holding. Now here's the argument again..."
I think you misinterpreted the decision. The ruling said that the plaintiffs didn't need to show that the defendants benefited from unauthorized copying by 3rd parties because the defendant's software's primary purpose was to encourage that unauthorized copying. The latter was sufficient to show liability for 3rd-party copyright infringement.
That being said, it's quite a stretch to apply that reasoning to YouTube. In fact, that ruling works in YouTube's favor as YouTube is marketed for the purpose of sharing user-created content. That it is being used (even substantially) for 3rd party copyright infringement is not solely the issue to determine if YouTube is liable for its user's actions. In the Sony case, the Justices noted that VCRs were largely used for 3rd party copyright infringement, but were still protected because they had substantial non-infringing uses. Since YouTube is complying with the DMCA by providing a means for copyright holders to mark their content for removal (and the DMCA requires copyright holders to shoulder the responsibility for finding and marking infringing materials), and assuming that YouTube removes the infringing content upon notification, then I think YouTube will readily prevail.
In the Grokster decision, Justice Breyer noted that the Court cannot possibly decide whether a technology has future non-infringing uses when even professionals in the field cannot agree. As such, it strongly implies that if a reasonable argument can be made for probable substantial non-infringing uses, then it's better to err on the side of the new technology than to decide against it and stifle future commerce.
Grokster is little more than a footnote regarding YouTube, and seems to have very little applicability to it.